Katrina Revisited

[Sean in New Orleans]

I am seeking flat stats on Katrina. What were winds upon landfall? What were highest sustained and highest gusts in and around New Orleans. What was the lowest pressures around New Orleans? Same types of info for Miss. Coast please. Thanks. I went straight under the hurricane, but, have never seen the interesting stats on the systems itself.

[wxmann_91]

I am seeking flat stats on Katrina. What were winds upon landfall? What were highest sustained and highest gusts in and around New Orleans. What was the lowest pressures around New Orleans? Same types of info for Miss. Coast please. Thanks. I went straight under the hurricane, but, have never seen the interesting stats on the systems itself.

Preliminarily...

Location, Winds, and Pressure at landfall...
Buras, LA - 140 mph, 918 mb
Ansley, MS - 125 mph, 927 mb

Gusts were over 100 mph in NO, 90 mph in Biloxi, and 80 mph in Mobile, according to Wikipedia. But I don't know the lowest pressures in that area, though I do believe a storm chaser in Gulfport measured 955 mb.

[Aslkahuna]

Chaser in Gulfport also recorded a 137 mph gust. The peak reported winds in Biloxi and Gulfport were the highest reported when the ASOS failed. Video from those locations suggest winds well in excess of 100 mph in gusts and well over sustained hurricane force.

Steve

[Derek Ortt]

120kt for louisiana,

cat 2 sustained for NO

115kt for mississippi

[Sean in New Orleans]

120kt for louisiana,

cat 2 sustained for NO

115kt for mississippi

Thanks for the info. There were some serious gusts in New Orleans if we only maintained category 2 sustained. I saw, with my own eyes, bricks, bicycles, plywood, numerous 2 by 4's etc. fly straight down St. Ann Street in the French Quarter completely parallel to the street. It was an awesome site. The saddest of sites was seeing 200+ year old oak trees uprooted and moved half way down the street. When I went up to Jackson Square (the Moon Walk) all I saw were tree stumps. The trees were completely gone, blown into the Mississippi River and were nowhere to be found. I saw sheets of metal wrapped around blown down trees on Canal Street. And there were several brick buildings in the French Quarter that I took pictures of that were leveled to nothing but a big pile of bricks. It was definitely a storm I will never forget. Concentration is focused on the floods, of course, but, I'm here to tell you, as a live witness, the winds blew extremely hard in New Orleans. I would swear on my life I witnessed gusts to over 140 mph from the objects that were carried down the street completely parallel to the streets....

[f5]

the reports are confusing some say CAT 3 others say CAT 4 i'll just wait for the NHC reanlysis

[Derek Ortt]

I'm not even sure if there were gusts over 140 in New Orleans, except maybe between the buildings where the wnd can be enhanced

Probably gusts to 125 tops at the airport, which for obvious reasons stopped reporting

[otowntiger]

120kt for louisiana,

cat 2 sustained for NO

115kt for mississippi

Thanks for the info. There were some serious gusts in New Orleans if we only maintained category 2 sustained. I saw, with my own eyes, bricks, bicycles, plywood, numerous 2 by 4's etc. fly straight down St. Ann Street in the French Quarter completely parallel to the street. It was an awesome site. The saddest of sites was seeing 200+ year old oak trees uprooted and moved half way down the street. When I went up to Jackson Square (the Moon Walk) all I saw were tree stumps. The trees were completely gone, blown into the Mississippi River and were nowhere to be found. I saw sheets of metal wrapped around blown down trees on Canal Street. And there were several brick buildings in the French Quarter that I took pictures of that were leveled to nothing but a big pile of bricks. It was definitely a storm I will never forget. Concentration is focused on the floods, of course, but, I'm here to tell you, as a live witness, the winds blew extremely hard in New Orleans. I would swear on my life I witnessed gusts to over 140 mph from the objects that were carried down the street completely parallel to the streets....

You'd be surprised at what winds of 100 mph would look like and feel like in person. If you've never experienced it before they might have seemed much worse then they actually were. From what I've seen in terms of overall storm damage in N.O. (albeit just on t.v) I'd be very surprised that you had winds that were much over 100mph except in very isolated areas. There were a lot of neighborhoods that I've been looking at due to all the flood coverage that seem to have sustained very little wind damage.

[Sean in New Orleans]

Thanks for the replies. I can only really go on what I witnessed from my own eyes 1/2 block from St. Louis Cathedral for 6 hours. I didn't have a wind guage and was in a protected spot for viewing, but, what I witnessed flying down the streets and disappearing in a couple of seconds was absolutley amazing. I was there, in New Orleans, on the ground for the entire experience and when you see whole bricks flying down the street and not hitting the ground, you're looking at some strong winds. It's something I know I'll remember for the remainder of my days, for sure....

[f5]

what were the winds over in bay st louis it looks like strong CAT 5 damage even though the NHC calls it something less.CAT 3 CAT 4